


I'm sorry... Excuse me?

by MagicalMilly



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Byleth telling people they're a goddess, Female My Unit | Byleth, Gen, Not Canon Compliant, Not Shippy, i guess, mostly banter, not super rhea positive
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-28
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:08:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27759682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagicalMilly/pseuds/MagicalMilly
Summary: Byleth decides to tell Claude about Sothis and the Time Warping and the being the Goddess practically thing.He does his best to take it well.Byleth laughs. A lot.
Relationships: My Unit | Byleth & Claude von Riegan
Comments: 1
Kudos: 26





	I'm sorry... Excuse me?

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!
> 
> So.... The timing for this fic is… nebulous. It’s after Jeralt’s death and the hair change, but before the time skip. Also, I know that Claude kinda finds out in game, but like, no time is spent on it and it is never brought up again even with Rhea screaming for Byleth to hear Sothis’s voice and… So I wanna do it differently.
> 
> So, here is Byleth interrupting a Claude Scheming Moment to blow his mind.

Boisterous laughter filled the air as their wyvern’s soared above the Monastery. 

“T-Teach?” Claude stammered, unused to the sound.

The laughter stopped suddenly, “Yes?” she responded.

“Teach… not that I don’t appreciate you actually showing me your emotions better, because I do… but… what the hell is so funny about what I just said?”

Byleth chuckled a few more times before wiping her eyes and looking over at Claude, “I’m sorry. I- I know your questions are serious and legitimate. However, there is information that Lady Rhea does not yet know. Nor do I feel like I am going to tell her.”

Claude froze, the beast underneath him pausing in the air with a lack of direction.

Byleth had flown a few more feet forward before realizing that Claude had stopped and turned around to join him. 

“Teach. I know that _you_ know that I asked you to do Sky Watch with me so I could scheme in private. But… Teach. Since when have you, Rhea’s favorite, started hiding things from Her Churchiness?”

There was a sly grin in response before her face became serious. She directed her wyvern close to Claude before sighing, “You know, if I have to tell anyone, you make the most sense. And, honestly, I need _someone_ to be the voice of reason for me in the future. We…” She looked off for a moment before starting again, frown on her face, “We should land for this conversation. I’ve told no one this before and I need to have both my feet firmly on the ground.” 

Without another word, she flew off, heading for an empty glade to land.

“What… the…” Claude breathed before suddenly snapping to attention and following her down. 

_What the fuck is going on? What secrets could she be holding? ‘Someone has to be the voice of reason’ I ‘make the most sense?’ What does she need me for? What is so hidden that she’s told no one? Why is she so nervous that she feels she needs to be grounded for it? Why did she frown?_

_Did her father leave her some information about the Church? Why did he run all those years ago?_

His head was still spinning with thoughts as he landed by his professor in the quiet glade. He gave Byleth a moment to get her thoughts in order by tending to their wyverns and allowing them to relax.

The silence was killing Claude. He _needed_ to know what was going on. But no, Teach was trying to trust him, and that required patience on his part. So he bit his tongue and waited. It wasn’t like he hadn’t just waited all year to open up to her legitimately about who he was.

He sighed, unable to find himself annoyed anymore after putting it like that. 

However, that sigh had reminded Byleth that if she was going to call a sudden serious discussion, she needed to actually talk about the topic of the discussion. 

“So, uh… Claude?”

“Yeah, Teach? What’s up?”

“You know how I… no, that’s not right.” She paused, “You remember all those times I would…” She frowned. “I’m bad at this.”

“Hey, Teach, it’s okay.” Claude put his hand on her shoulder, “I know you’re working on everything. Just take your time, and know that if you explain something wrong, I’ll ask questions until you get it right!” He beamed. 

“I don’t think I could take another round of Claude Questioning.” Byleth deadpanned.

Claude sputtered, “Are you telling me you _don’t_ enjoy when I ask questions in class? TEACH.”

“You asked me if any of the men were afraid of spiders that we would be fighting in the lesson plan I made about how to keep towns safe from bandits.”

“ _It could have been useful._ ”

“IT WAS A SIMULATION.”

At her raising her voice, Claude burst out in raucous laughter. After shaking her head for a moment, Byleth couldn’t help but join in. 

Once they quieted down, Claude winked at Byleth, “So, you feel more up to talking now?”

She shook her head in disbelief, “I can’t believe how good you are at getting me out of bad thoughts.”

A smirk was his only response.

“Okay, okay. So, you read my father’s diary right?” She sat down on a rock in the glade.

“Yeah, I did. Your pops had a way with romance, I have got to say.” Claude flopped down on the grass near here, arms behind his head.

“Not that part.” she rolled her eyes, “The part about how I was born and Rhea.”

“Oh, that part.” It came out stilted, “I have been trying to figure out that part…. Did you know you didn’t have a heartbeat? How does that even work?”

She shrugged, “Magic? Also, well, I just thought it was normal until my father sat me down and told me to stop telling everyone that his chest was loud.”

Claude burst out into laughter once more as Byleth blushed. “Please don’t get me off track.”

“Oh, but you make it so difficult…. Fine. I _will_ be keeping that for a future conversation though.”

Byleth rolled her eyes and groaned before picking up where she left off, “Anyways, Father ran off because he assumed Rhea did something…”

“Yeah!” Claude cut in, “I’ve been spending all week trying to figure out what the hell it was that Rhea did.”

“When I first arrived here…. Father told me to be careful around her. To not fall into her trap.” She bit her lip.

“But why?” Claude flung his hands up in the air.

“I think I know why.”

Claude sat straight up and spun to face her. “Why.”

“Claude…” she sighed, “I’m really going to need you to believe me. I promise you I’m telling the truth.”

He narrowed his eyes, “What the hell are you about to tell me?” He shook his head, “No matter, I believe you. I mean, you’re somehow alive without a heartbeat… I don’t know why I can’t believe another fantastical thing.”

“Okay.” She shrug, a disbelieving tone covering her words.

A deep breath.

“You know how you asked me about whether or not I believed in Sothis and Seiros and Fodlan religion in general?”

“And we both agreed that nature was where it was at, yeah?”

“Sothis is very, very real.”

“Oh no… are you going all religion on me? You really don’t need to take me to a nature glade and show me how Sothis made trees or some shit to get me to have a level of spirituality…. I think you’re taking the whole Sword of the Creator Thing too far.”

Byleth paused until he was done. “You good?”

“Yeah.”

“Thank you. Anyways, Sothis is real. Because somehow Rhea stuck her heart into my chest as a baby and Sothis lived in my head.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. And that’s not all.”

“There’s _more._ More than ‘I don’t have a heart beat because I have a Relic in my chest instead?’”

“You know how Rhea is going on and on about the sacred ceremony soon?”

Claude hmmed.

Byleth started laughing again.

“This is the funny part? You know something about that ceremony?” Claude was leaning forward.

“I know it’s useless.”

“What.”

“She wants me to do it to see if I can hear the Voice of Sothis. She’s doing all of this pomp and circumstance for that.”

“Yes?”

“I’ve been able to hear the Voice of Sothis _forever._ ”

Claude blinked.

And blinked again.

“Excuse me? Teach? Did you just say you could _hear the voice of the Goddess Sothis?_ ”

“Well. I could before the… transformation… Things changed after that.”

“I’m scared to learn more.”

“She joined with me when we had to break out of that Darkness. I guess I now _am_ Sothis? Kinda?”

“ _Kinda._ ” Claude’s voice was scaling higher and higher the longer she was talking. “ _You kinda are just a GODDESS?_ ”

“And she gave me Time powers?”

“YOU CAN CONTROL TIME?”

“Yell it any louder?” She glared at him. “Also, I can’t control time. I can only rewind like… an hour at most. And it exhausts me. So, I only use it when otherwise there would have been a fatal blow.”

“So… all those near death experiences….”

“You’re welcome.” 

“And Rhea knows _none_ of this?”

“You’re the first person to know.”

“I…. Teach…” He choked up.

She turned her head inquisitively.

He stood up snatched her up in a giant hug and spun her around. “Teach. Your secret is safe with me.”

After a moment, she hugged back, “I knew it was.”

They hugged for a moment until Claude pulled back, “Wait, so is _that_ what you meant when you said that you needed a voice of reason? Because you lost yours?”

Byleth pouted and looked away from him, “You know, this is surprisingly like her. Helping me one moment, insulting me the next.”

“WAIT. Is that why you would make faces during class!” He paused. “IS THAT HOW YOU KNEW I WAS INSULTING LORENZ WITH HILDA?”

“You called me a Goddess. And, as Goddess, I know all.” She smirked, “Duh.”

He laughed for a moment before laughing loudly, “No wonder you were laughing so hard at my scheming today. I was _so_ off base.”

“I really liked the one where Rhea was going to choose one of the Deer to transform into the next Seteth, starting with probably Lorenz.”

“I mean… he would be the most fitting choice? You think Raphael would be a good replacement?”

“Maybe Ignatz? He has the green hair.”

“And the Goddess obsession.”

The two of them kept quipping back and forth as they climbed their wyverns and took back to the skies.

**Author's Note:**

> Hey!
> 
> I had fun writing this.
> 
> It may not be the best thing I've written on this site, but it's been stuck in my head since I first played the game. The first time I did the whole Ceremony with the Throne... I was just like... what if By was just like "what if I just was like, 'you dumbass, I've heard the goddess's voice up until this moment you absolute buffoon.'"
> 
> I also like the banter. I just worry that it's too much dialogue and not enough stuff. But this was a dialogue heavy thing... bleh.
> 
> And so, I write it out.


End file.
